


Open Road

by Molly



Category: Supernatural
Genre: First Kiss, First Time, Future Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-05-12
Updated: 2010-05-12
Packaged: 2017-10-09 10:12:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,994
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/86064
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Molly/pseuds/Molly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam's old enough to know what's good for him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Open Road

When the dust settles on the almost-apocalypse, there's the road, and the car, and Sam. Three things that have been with Dean for as long as he can remember. The road got longer and Sam got taller but the car, at least, has stayed pretty much the same. A few more creaks in her undercarriage, a few more scrapes on her paint job. Easy enough to manage. Sam will be harder.

Dean pulls over, sending up a puff of dust on the side of the road. He gets out, goes around the hood and leans against the car on Sam's side. Waits. This far north it's chilly in the mornings, even in the middle of May. The sun tries, throws sparks off chrome and glass, but the wind blows away any warmth before it has a chance to gather. It rushes through the trees, making them sway and bob.

It's been hours since they saw any other cars. Didn't used to be that way, but in the weeks since the planet wobbled and Sam caught it, people started keeping indoors. Dean figures they'll get over it; being alone is a lot scarier than most demons, even at their worst. Always has been for him, anyway. But he doesn't have to worry about that now.

Not anymore.

Sam gets out and slams the door a little harder than is good for it, which makes Dean glare at his brother until he remembers what he stopped for. He pockets the glare for later. Sam settles against the car beside him, arms folded, ankles crossed, just like Dean's are. That gives Dean a moment; Sam follows him, just like before, just like always, even after everything they've killed and saved and lost and won. It worries him for a minute, that same old corrosive worry, but he pushes it away. It used to be harder to do that; not so much, now. A little less weight on his own shoulders, a little more trust in Sam to know his own way -- it evens out. If his shoulders feel a little weird about it now and then, well. It'll pass.

"Kind of a weird place for a pit stop," Sam says. He looks up, sun in his eyes, at the trees across the road. It's a nice view, Dean thinks. All of it.

"Yeah, well." Dean shrugs. "I wanted to talk about my feelings."

Sam laughs, head going back, happier than Dean's seen him in years. Dean drops the serious mask and grins with him, and it feels good, so fucking good just to stand there and be happy with his brother. He waits it out, smiling even more when Sam winds down and settles just a little closer, pressing against his shoulder.

"So, talk," Sam says finally, nudging him with an elbow. "What's so important it couldn't wait for a stop light?"

"Take a little longer than that, I guess." Dean looks up at Sam, at that face that's been in front of him or beside him for his entire life, give or take a couple of years that don't matter as much as he used to think they did. "You grew up on me, you know? At school, a little, but mostly these past few years."

"I got old these past few years," Sam says. "I keep feeling like I should have some gray hairs or something. Sore knees. Whatever."

"That's me." Dean tries to look up at his own hair, which is too short for that to be possible, and ends up with an ache between his eyes.

Sam nudges at him again, this time harder. "Ass. Your knees never hurt a day in your life." He doesn't say anything about the gray hairs, though, so Dean makes a note to take a closer look at the mirror tomorrow morning.

"Thing is, Sam, you're not a kid anymore. I know I've been saying that for a while now, but I guess mostly I've been trying to convince myself. I had to, to let you do the things you had to do."

"Let us do the things we had to do," Sam says.

Dean nods. "Yeah, okay."

"This is starting to sound a little ominous."

"Sorry."

"This isn't the part where you tell me, so long, you're going off to find Lisa and Ben again, is it? Because you know that was just pre-apocalypse panic, right? That's not you." There's a tension around Sam's mouth now, and that stubborn set to his jaw that says he's gearing up to fight if he needs to.

Dean rolls his eyes. "I _know_ that."

"Well then, what is this?" Sam straightens up and stands in front of Dean, looking taller because Dean's still slouched against the car. "You're making me really nervous," he says, and Dean tilts his head back and grins again because Sam's about ten feet tall and three feet wide from this angle, and looks about as nervous as a Wendigo at dinnertime.

"Listen. I just wanted to get that out of the way, okay? I get that you're all grown up now and I trust you to know what's good for you and what's not. What you want, and what you don't. I just needed to put that out there, because it's gonna be really important in a minute, when I say what I came out here to say."

"Which is?"

"Come here."

Sam frowns, eyes narrowing. "What?"

Dean shakes his head. For all that Sam loves talking about shit, he's never really been all that good with words. He's a show, don't tell kind of guy. Dean's spent a long time waiting for the right words from Sam when he should have been watching for signs, so he should know.

"I said, come here," Dean says again, and reaches out to hook two fingers in Sam's belt loops, and gives a tug. Sam's eyes go wide, Dean tugs again, and Sam takes a stumbling step forward. His hands come down on either side of Dean's shoulders, palms pressed against glass.

"Dean?"

"All the way here," Dean clarifies. And to make sure there's no misunderstanding, he takes hold of the collar of Sam's jacket with a shaky hand, and pulls him down.

His heartbeat pounds in his ears, louder than anything in this cool bright spot in the road, and at first it's just from the dare of it, the way the moment spins on its edge like a quarter and he can't tell which way it's gonna fall. Sam's lips are chapped and warm and still, terrifyingly still, so much that Dean almost wishes for his little brother back, the one who would go with him anywhere without question, the one who always wanted whatever Dean had to give him. Dean loved that kid till it made him sick in the heart and head, till it broke him down completely.

But then there was this guy, tall as a redwood and twice as strong, standing up in Sammy's shoes and picking Dean up and putting him back together. This ridiculous, smart, vicious, amazing person with Sam's face and Sam's hands and Sam's heart, this stranger Dean loves more than anybody else in the world. _Sam._ Who knows his own mind and his own will, and doesn't take crap from anybody. Not even Dean.

So Dean takes a breath, calms himself, steadies himself. Whatever Sam decides, Dean can take it.

"Any time now, genius," he says against Sam's mouth, and slides his hand up to the back of Sam's neck. He kisses Sam again, keeping it light and easy and giving him every opportunity to back off, laugh it off, let go.

"You fucking lunatic," Sam says, his eyes half-dazed with shock, and then he falls on Dean like an avalanche.

Sam's mouth opens up, his hands shift to Dean's arms, his body shoves Dean's back against the car. It's a little like being mauled by a very friendly bear and a lot like Dean's idea of heaven. He lets everything go, puts himself in Sam's hands, and it's more than he thought it would be, more than the comfort and love he'd hoped it would be; it's like coming back to life inside, painful and raw and perfect. He bites at Sam's lips, pushes his tongue inside, and Sam makes this noise from deep in his chest that destroys Dean's capacity for thought. Sam holds onto him like he thinks Dean might try to get away, and that's both stupid and hot; Dean pushes up against his brother, fights to get his hands on him. He pushes Sam's shirt up and slides his hand over smooth muscle, warm skin. Sam's stomach flutters against Dean's fingers and Dean strokes, touch-hungry, then slides his arms around Sam's waist and pulls him in tight.

"Who's crazy now?" Dean says against Sam's throat, his voice shaking. He pushes a kiss into Sam's skin where his neck curves down into shoulder and holds back against the sudden, sharp urge to bite.

Sam's hands come up to frame Dean's jaw, pulling him up to his mouth again. Dean goes; it's good, stupidly heartbreakingly good. It's Sam.

"Never thought in a million years I could have this," Sam says. His voice cracks and breaks around the words and he doesn't look up from Dean's mouth. "I never thought you'd let it happen."

"Another chapter in your long and storied career in being wrong."

"You never said anything, or. You never seemed to want--"

"Well, I was busy," Dean says, starting to get a little irritated. "We needed to save the world first."

"I'm just saying, a little _incentive_ might've--"

"Incentive to _save the world?_" Dean growls, and then he sees Sam's grin, and Sam is laughing again, chest rumbling against Dean's, laughing and wrapping himself around Dean until it's impossible to breathe and impossible not to laugh right along with him.

"You really are insane," Sam says softly, when they've both wound down. "You thought I might say no."

"I had to know you could say no, that's all." Dean shoves him back, gets a little air between them. He's gonna have to drive soon, and needs more control than he has.

"I always could have. Might have, a couple of years ago. But any time since then?" Sam shakes his head, leans in and takes a sweet, sharp nip at Dean's throat. "No way," he whispers, his breath heated and soft against Dean's ear. "I'm in. One hundred percent."

"I have to _drive_, Sammy," Dean groans, "don't do that," and there's Sam's mouth again, right where he left it.

"Shoulda thought of that before you made your move in the middle of the road," Sam says, and peels himself away. He dangles something bright and shiny in Dean's face, and it's his fucking car keys, and Sam wasn't groping him just then; he was _robbing_ him.

Dean makes a grab for them, and Sam yanks them up out of reach. Dean hates this game; has hated it since Sam turned fifteen and shot up like a magic beanstalk. He folds his arms and glares, refusing to participate.

"Awesome," Sam says smugly. "_I'll_ drive." He ruffles Dean's hair with his other hand, laughing when Dean jerks away. Then he reaches for Dean in a different way. Dean stays put, and tilts his head back, and just that fast they're back where they started. It's like clouds across the sun -- light, then dark; one thing, and then another. Sam's his brother, and he's also _this_, and Dean doesn't really care which he gets one minute to the next as long as he can have both.

He opens up for one last kiss, sweet and hot, and then he pushes Sam away. "You drive," he agrees, opening the door and dropping himself down into the passenger seat. He gives Sam a long, weighted look up through the open door, and grins. "Drive _fast._"

**Author's Note:**

> * My beta readers are awesome! Thank you, torch and laura :)
> 
> * Feedback is &lt;3


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